


Love and Other Nonsense

by Aelys_Althea



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Brief Implied Homophobia, Denial, Disney Prompt - Hercules, First Crush, Harry is not Happy, Hogwarts Eighth Year, If you can identify them, Internalised Homophobia, Love Confessions, M/M, Post-War, Prompt Fic, The Muses - Freeform, fest fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-03
Updated: 2019-07-03
Packaged: 2020-01-13 12:36:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18469099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aelys_Althea/pseuds/Aelys_Althea
Summary: Harry wasn't in love. No way. It wasn't even a crush, because it couldn't be. Surely.Or so he thought until he found he couldn't stop thinking about a certain someone. Denial doesn't last for long when you've got a couple of helpful portraits to help realise the truth.Based on the prompt: 'I Won't Say (I'm In Love)' - Disney Hercules





	Love and Other Nonsense

**Author's Note:**

> ~Written for the H/D Wireless Fest, 2019~
> 
> Thank you to the wonderful mods for hosting this fest this year. It was so much fun to write for! Thank you, too, to my lovely prompter punk-rock-yuppie. I hope you enjoy my interpretation, and thank you for the suggestion! :D

Bursting through the doorway, Harry almost tumbled head over heels. Stumbling, his desperate hold on the doorknob the only thing keeping him on his feet, he spun immediately and slammed the door closed.

Fuck. Jesus-bloody-fuck.

His breath came in ragged pants, and it had very little to do with the short dash he'd made from the prefect's bathroom. Pressed against the closed door, fingers digging into the wood, he stared down at the backs of his hands as they shook in violent tremors.

Fuck. Fucking hell. He was in such a goddamn mess.

Flashes of memory assaulted him in a string of disjointed images. Steamed mirrors. Slick tiles. The gentle lap of water in the oversized bath as another body joined him without his notice. Too much warmth, too much vivid heat, and then a different kind of warmth that had nothing to do with the simmering water. Swallowing thickly, struggling to get a grasp upon the renewed warmth the burst in his cheeks, Harry closed his eyes. He let his head drop back against the door with a soft thud.

"I am so stupid," he said, speaking each word slowly just to hear them aloud. To remind himself of what he already knew. What he surely knew. "If there's a goddamn prize for shit life choices, then…"

_Then I've definitely won it._

"What's that, hon?"

Eyes springing open, Harry's head snapped forward. His back slammed against the door where his hands had been as he darted a wild glance around the room. A voice? Someone was -? Someone else was in the Room?

It was the first time since his frantic arrival that he'd taken stock of what the Room of Requirement had become for him. He'd seen it in a number of colours, a range of shapes, and cluttered with as many miscellaneous goods and useful tools as he could think of. He'd never seen it quite like this, though, and even in the riotous horror of his thoughts it was nigh impossible not to take a pause to appreciate it.

How grass grew inside, in a five-walled room that not only lacked windows but also at times shifted the very floor itself, Harry didn't know. How it managed to appear like early evening, just light enough to see by and illuminated by pinpricks of twinkling light overhead that could have been stars, he didn't know either. All of it, from the smooth, elegant lines of the pale path weaving through the grass to the marble fountain bubbling in the centre of the room, the white walls draped in gossamer, golden curtains, the sprouts of white flowers blooming in each crevice, was nothing short of breathtaking.

 _Romantic_ , murmured a voice in the back of Harry's head, and he winced in renewed horror, forced back to the present. No. Not romantic. It didn't matter that his stupid head seemed to have risen to become stuck in the clouds from the moment he'd turned around in the prefect bathroom, from the second he'd caught a glimpse of more pale, exposed skin than he'd wanted – than he'd _thought_ he'd wanted – to see and dragged his gaze like a hypnotised snake over lines of muscle, trickles of dribbling water, and the elegant sweep of pale hair dampened by steam. It didn't matter, didn't matter a bit, was not relevant, and Harry should definitely not be thinking anything was romantic –

"You alright over there, sugar? You're lookin' a little bit lost."

Lurching away from the door, Harry spun in place. He turned a staggering circle, frantic once more, eyes sweeping over every goddamn romantic corner of the Room. The door, the walls, the chuckling bubble of the fountain beneath the humanoid statue of a man striking a pose. For one horrible minute, the sight of the nude statue caught Harry's attention and held it. Was that…? Was what he thought, what he felt, an indication that he was…?

 _No. No, not now. Not fucking now._ Harry gave a fervent mental shake of his head and spun once more in search of the source of the voices. Two voices, it was. That someone might bear witness to him having a hysterical breakdown was one thing; to consider his oncoming sexuality crisis to be the second act of the performance would be even worse.

"Who said that?" Harry demanded.

"Over here, sweetie. Take a look this way."

This time, when Harry turned in a wild spin, he really did trip. It was enough that he would have easily greeted the marble floor with his face had it not been for the raised edge of the fountain providing a convenient handhold. Resolutely ignoring the naked statue barely an arm's length away from him, Harry turned towards the direction he'd heard the voice.

There was no one there. Or at least no one real. Instead, a single portrait depicting a smiling face stared back at him. He had an impression of frizzy hair, of a long neck, and then another voice caught his attention.

"Are you alright over there, little dove?" the first voice who had spoken, gentle and sympathetic, dragged Harry's gaze over his shoulder to the opposite side of the room. A woman, as the first portrait appeared to be, with flowing curls that seemed to all but tumble over the edge of her gilded picture frame. The false stars overhead gave him enough of a glimpse of her face that he could read sympathy in its gentle lines. "You're looking a bit upset. Can we possibly lend you a hand?"

"Or an ear," said another voice, sending Harry pivoting once more. "I have two to spare, sugar."

"Or even a suggestion," said a fourth, and Harry turned to the closest wall. A statuesque woman, barely more than a silhouetted half-portrait, folded her arms as though resting upon the edge of her frame. Her portrait itself looked big enough for another half a dozen of her to fit inside, dominating the wall it hung upon. "That's what we're here for, you see."

Harry blinked. Portraits. They were just portraits. _Or not 'just portraits',_ he reminded himself. In a place like Hogwarts, portraits could whisper secrets as easily as a real pair of lips. Often more easily, as Harry had found; most seemed to have very little to do with their time and leapt upon any potential hint of gossip like a cat on a rat.

"I," he began, then stopped. He flicked his gaze to each of the portraits – five in total, one for each wall – and swallowed. He could really do without this right now. His heart was still clamouring for attention in his chest, his hands still shaking where he clung to the edge of the fountain, and his legs foolishly felt more like folding beneath him than persisting in their duty of keeping him upright.

 _Honestly,_ a sensible thought grumbled, _you've faced Voldemort, and Death Eaters, and magical creatures. Four years ago you faced off against a fucking dragon. Get it together._

Yes, getting it together. That would be nice.

"Who are you?" Harry managed, his voice a little hoarse, a little croaking.

"We're your friends, sugar," called the voice from the wall directly behind him. A glance over his shoulder saw a round face and plump cheeks, a beaming smile flashing white upon the woman's dark lips. "A consolatory support group."

"A what?"

"We're here to help," the tall woman in the tall portrait said. "It's what we do."

"What you -?"

"With everyone who needs to drop a word or two for whatever reason," said the woman with the pony-tail.

"I –"

"Although it always does tend to be for the same reason," the plump woman said.

Across the room, in what Harry realised with a glance came from the only portrait who hadn't spoken, a humming tune arose. The woman depicted, thin-faced and smiling like the rest of them were, smiled just a little wider when she caught his eye. Her humming rose in volume, and Harry couldn't help but frown. That tune… He was sure he'd heard it somewhere before. Wistful, and smooth, and –

"A little trouble in the love department, have you, hon?" the tall woman said.

Just like that, Harry's belly plummeted to his feet. He wheeled back to her, fingers clutching the edge of the fountain. "What? L-love?"

The kind-faced woman nodded gently. "You've got the look about you, little dove. The colour."

"What? No –"

"What is it, sweetie?" The pony-tail woman shared a glance with the portraits on her adjacent walls. "Is it gazing from afar? A long-distance love?"

Harry flinched. _Christ, gazing?_ "No –"

"No, no, it's not that," the plump woman said, and a glance showed her waving a dismissive hand at her fellow. "You can always tell the pining ones. They sigh a lot."

"Sigh?"

"I don't think it's a little crush," the tall woman said, clicking her tongue. "It's not, is it, hon? Not something small?"

 _Yes! Yes, it is! It's small, negligible, it's nothing, it's –_ "I don't have a crush," Harry blurted out. _Not a crush, please not a crush, please –_

"Ah."

Four voices rose in an understanding sigh, the fifth a lilting hum, and glances drew sidelong as smiles becoming knowing. Harry swallowed. What the bloody hell had he walked into? The day had taken a turn in the most remarkable – and horrible – manner he could have expected. Or not expected, as it were. In what world would he possibly have thought an afternoon of quidditch followed by a leisurely bathe in the prefect's bathroom would result in this?

Never. Never ever. And definitely not because of – because of _him._

The memory of miles of pale skin, slick shoulders, and cheeks flushed faintly pink from the heat, rose in Harry's mind. To the twittering of kindly voices, Harry let his legs crumple, his face dropping into his hands. Knees steepled before him, he pressed his covered face into them and muffled a groan.

 _I don't have a crush_ , he thought. And yet he kind of did – or at least something like it.

 _I don't even like_ him, he tried to remind himself, except that wasn't quite right either, because he wasn't 'him' anymore. He used to be a jerk, a loud-mouthed git, and entirely incapable of a civil conversation without either starting a fight or putting his bloody foot in his mouth, but now…

 _I don't even fancy boys_ – except that maybe he did? – _and he's not even good-looking_ – except that maybe he was? Harry didn't know. He couldn't tell. How did anyone know if they were… if they were… gay? How did they realise if someone was… if they were maybe just a little…

"No," Harry said firmly into his knees. "No way. Not a chance."

"What was that, hon?"

All but whimpering to himself, Harry raised his head from his knees. His fingers fought to remain clamped shut, but with an effort he pried them apart to peer at the tall woman's portrait. He blinked at the sight of not one face but all five of the painted women crammed into the frame. "I said no," Harry repeated.

"No what?" the gentle-faced woman said, tipping her head.

"No, I don't have a crush."

"Well, of course not, sugar," the plump woman said. She winked at him knowingly. "It's far more than a crush at this point, isn't it?"

Harry cringed. "N-no, it's not, it's –"

"It's alright to admit it," the tall woman said.

"I don't –"

"Often it's easier when you just let it all out, sweetie," the pony-tail one said, and the woman still humming her song nodded sagely.

"No, no, I don't – I mean, I won't –"

"Just let it all out, hon."

"I don't like him!" Harry barely realised he was shouting, but it didn't matter. Hands falling to clutch instead at his knees, he stared up at the five women with nothing short of desperation. "I don't! I can't! After everything, it's impossible. I – we have always, always fought, and he gets on my every goddamn nerve, and he – he fought on the other side of the war! I don't like him! Not even a little bit, I swear!"

Silence met his words. An echoing silence, resounding with the words he'd spoken. Somehow, whether for the wide emptiness of the room or the marble walls and floors, it all became remarkably clear. Harry couldn't help but wince as the nature of his warbling plea was made starkly apparent.

_Oh my god. No way._

"Maybe you should start at the beginning," the tall woman said, nodding the rest of them on either side of her did. "How about that, hon?"

Voldemort. Death Eaters. Magical creatures that made dragons look tame, and a Wizarding world rife with hexes and curses flung with terrifying carelessness. All of it Harry had faced before and he hadn't backed down. Not once. He couldn't.

So why was this so much harder to stand before and raise his head high in the face of?

Harry didn't want to. He didn't want to talk to the strange women before him, the portraits, the smiling, gentle, listening owners of 'pairs of ears' that were more than ready to witness the telling of his supposed woes. Harry thought he might have preferred to never speak another word again.

Which was why it was strange when his mouth opened and words started spilling forth.

"Well… I guess it all started when I was eleven…"

* * *

"So, let us straighten out the facts here, hon," Calliope said, the teetering pile of her hair bobbling slightly as she shook her head. The only remaining woman in the largest of portraits, she was nothing if not direct in her approach. That much Harry had gleaned over the past however long he'd been in her company for. "You've been attending school with this boy for seven whole years."

Harry, sitting cross-legged with his back against the raised edge of the fountain, nodded heavily. "Yes."

"And you've disliked each other for most of that time."

"Disliked is a pretty tame way of saying it," Harry muttered, eyes fixed upon the grass before him.

"But not this year." Clio supplied from her own picture frame, tapping her chin thoughtfully. She'd chuckled her way through sharing her name with Harry, nothing if not amused by his blank-faced confusion about its vague familiarity. Something about Greek history, she'd said. "You don't dislike him anymore?"

Harry's shoulders hunched towards his ears. He didn't know what it was about the room, about the 'romantic' setting as it was – which it still definitely was – and the portraits that asked too many questions and encouraged too enthusiastically. For whatever reason, the words had spilled from Harry's lips in a relentless torrent that he hadn't a hope of withholding. He'd spoken more in the past hour – hours? - than he thought he'd done the whole year before that, and that was even counting the tedium of equally relentless interviews he'd been forced into. The _Daily Prophet_ still seemed to treat his words like nuggets of gold, even months after the war.

"No," he muttered, plucking at a blade of grass. "Not this year."

"Because he's such a hunk, am I right, sugar?" Thalia said. At Harry wince, and Calliope flung a barked rebuke at the plump woman, who only clicked her tongue. "Oh, come on. You catch sight of him buck naked in the bathroom –"

"Oh god," Harry said, squeezing his eyes closed.

"- and have a eureka moment of realisation for the feelings you've been having –"

"Eureka?" Clio said, tapping her chin again.

"- and you don't think that has a whole lot to do with it?" At the lull that met her words, Thalia clicked her tongue again. "To hell with you all, then."

"To Hades," Clio corrected absently.

"Now, now, little dove, there's no reason to be so upset at the thought," Melpomene said so gently it was as though she were physically patting Harry's shoulder. A glance towards her found her attention fixed solely upon Harry. "There's nothing wrong with finding him attractive."

"I… I can't –" Harry attempted, then cut himself off. It took an internal struggle before he could continue. "I mean, I don't. I like girls."

"Do you?" Mel asked. She somehow made it seem a question of simple curiosity rather than accusation.

Harry nodded, though with markedly less certainty than he would have once. He did like girls. Had liked them. Once upon a time, what felt like so long ago, he'd dated Ginny. Before that, he'd dated Cho. He liked _girls_ , not _boys_ , regardless of what the resurfacing mental image he'd caught in the prefect's bathroom suggested. It wasn't like he was –

"Can't you like both, then, hon?" Calliope asked. "Although, I don't know why you'd think it such a bad thing to just be one or the other. Why, I'll have you know that some of the greatest legends had male partners."

Harry snapped his head up from his downturned staring. "What?"

"Yes, yes, of course they did. Surely you've heard –"

"No." Harry shook his head slowly. "Legends? Who -? Wait – what?"

"Yes, yes, they did." Calliope bubbled with laughter so genuine that Harry almost couldn't disbelieve her. "Why, there's Achilles, naturally, and his Patrocles. Prosymnus certainly chased Dionysus his fair share, and Heracles had a number of male partners throughout his life besides his wife, did he not?"

Harry stared up at her, rendered mute and more than a little stunned. What? What was she going on about?

"There was Orpheus," Clio called from across the room, and a glance her way found her finger rising from her chin into the air at a point. "Everyone seems to forget he never took another wife after Eurydice, but he had his share of male lovers, too."

"Yes, yes, Orpheus," Calliope said, nodding vigorously.

"And poor old Chrysippus, too, the sorry lad," Mel said with a sigh.

"Yes, and Chrysippus."

"Not to mention that every God has taken a bite of that cake." As Harry spared her portrait a glance, Clio winked at him, poking her tongue out as she held up a hand and began ticking fingers off. "Zeus was terrible, you know? And Apollo –"

"Poor Hyacinthus, too," Mel said with another sigh.

"And Dionysus himself, naturally, for who doesn't partake when they're a little in their drinks?" Thalia chuckled before continuing, and Harry could only stare as he listened. He had such a thin grasp of what they were talking about that, in his already strung state, he felt battered by each announcement. These legends… They were -?

"Artemis never did give in to Callisto, did she?" Mel said, speaking through Thalia's continuation with a glance towards Clio for confirmation. At Clio's shaking head, she heaved a third sigh. "Silly girl."

"- and everyone knows Hermes is basically the god of the phallus," Thalia was saying. She chuckled again. "What was that, in the Peloponnesian War, with those statues of the phallus put all over the place?"

"Ah, yes. Was it Thucididyes?"

"No, no, not Thucididyes, dear, it was that other Athenian boy –"

"He was such a good lad. He was gay too, wasn't he?"

"I thought bisexual, but who knows?"

"People didn't care for naming such things in those days, did they?"

"No, not at all, not at all…"

Harry switched his attention between each of the portraits as they jumped back and forth, criss-crossing and recalling. History. Legends. That was what they were going on about? And that was supposed to help somehow?

 _It doesn't even matter if other people do it,_ Harry thought, raking a hand through his hair as Thalia raised her second hand to continue her ranting and counting. _Even if I really was – even if I_ did _somehow find him attractive, it wouldn't matter. Doesn't matter. It can't, because –_

"It would never work," Harry found himself saying.

Voices died around him. With a heavy exhalation, Harry glanced at each portrait in turn. At Calliope, frowning thoughtfully, and Mel's sympathetic concern, her forehead crinkled. Clio with her head cocked and Thalia her hand still raised to count. Only the fifth portrait, belonging to the one that Calliope had briefly named Terpsichore, didn't appear fazed but kept on humming the same tune she'd maintained almost since Harry had first stepped into the room. She offered him a smile as she swayed to her own music.

"It would never work?" Calliope echoed. "And why is that, hon?"

Harry swallowed thickly. Where did he even begin? "Because he hates me."

"Oh, I doubt that, sweetie," Clio said.

"No, he does. So – I mean, even if I did fancy him, he'd never like me in return."

"Nonsense," Thalia said, blowing her lips. "You're adorable, sugar."

"He's from a different house to me," Harry continued, barely hearing her, "and everyone expects us to stay as far away from each other as possible. Which we do. Sort of. Because that's what we always try to do, always have done, and it would be weird if we didn't."

Closing his eyes, Harry tipped his head back until it rested upon the edge of the fountain. "My friends hate him, you know. All of them do. I doubt Ron would even try to consider that he's changed, or that he might not be as much of a wanker as everyone says he is. And Hermione? Surely she'd hate me if I said I liked him, what with everything he's said to her."

Barely aware of his own words now, of the admittance within them that spilled forth so easily in the Room, Harry balled his hands into fists, thudding them softly on the ground at his sides. "He's an outcast, you know. Everyone hates him because of the war, even though he was pardoned, and even though it was more his parents who joined in on the wrong side than him. It's not fair, really, is it? And – and he really is different this year. He's..."

"Nicer?" one of the women asked, a gentle prod.

Harry snorted, eyes opening to stare up at the star-like pin-pricks of light on the ceiling. "I doubt he could ever be _nice_ , but yeah. He is a bit nicer."

"Friendly?" someone else asked.

Harry pulled a face. Friendly? _Him_? And yet… "Sort of. You know we've actually worked together in class? Not by choice, but it's actually not disastrous. He's really good at Potions."

"You don't fight anymore, do you?"

"No." Harry shook his head, the motion made a little uncomfortable from the marble he rested his head upon. "Not anymore. Maybe we've got it all out of our systems or something, or – or maybe it's just… maybe I just…"

"Realised you might not hate him as much as you'd thought?"

 _Yes._ Harry's sigh was only in his head this time, and silent. Kept to himself rather than breathed out loud, it was somehow easier to admit it all. Despite that he liked girls, always had, and he cared for his friends and always would – despite that they'd been on opposite sides of the war…

_Yes. I don't hate him as much as I thought. Not at all._

The room was silent. Utterly silent. It took Harry a moment to realise that even Terpsichore had ceased her singing. Blinking his eyes open, Harry was a little surprised to find his vision had blurred. It was so unexpected that for a moment he thought he might have lost his glasses somewhere. But no. It wasn't that. It was just that –

"This room always brings out the best in people, hon," Calliope said, gentle and soft, like a soothing balm to the abrupt ache that had taken up residence in Harry's chest. "The best and the worst. The good and the bad."

"Right," Harry said. His voice caught a little, choking slightly, but he couldn't bring himself to care.

"We get the chance to reflect upon the truth of our personal history," Clio said just as softly. "To view it without the tarnish of bias."

"Yeah." Harry could see that. In such a short time, it had certainly grown harder to tell himself what he almost ached to hear. To feel what he should be feeling.

"It can be a little funny, when you think about it," Thalia said, and though she chuckled it had its own soothing edge to it.

"And a little sad, too," Melpomene said, the quietest of all of them

Harry swallowed. Yeah, he could see that. All of that. Hands rising to his face, he slipped fingers behind his glasses and scrubbed his eyes. "Right. I get it. You're helping me, just like everything in this room does."

"Precisely," Calliope said. "Will you let us help you once more?"

Help him. Help him with what? To see more of the truth? To be more honest, or to perhaps laugh at himself, or burst into tears at the impossibility of something he'd only just realised he wanted? "Sure," Harry said ruefully. "Go for it."

"If this boy was standing before you right now, what would you say to him?"

Harry scoffed. What would he say? That depended, he supposed. If he really saw him, he'd keep his lips firmly shut. If he saw him, he would still his tongue upon every utterance that rose to the fore, every consideration and confusion, and push it down deep within him. But in the Room it was different. It was easier. Safe, even.

"I would say –" Harry paused. Swallowing, he took a deep breath and closed his eyes once more. "I would say that you're a pig, or you were. And that I hated you, and that I don't know if I can forgive a whole lot of things that happened last year, and all the years before that."

"But?" Calliope prompted.

"But, that I kind of like you, too. A lot, actually. And that it's really, really weird, because it somehow happened before I even realised anything was changing. I'd say that I think you're really smart, and I can't believe I never properly noticed before, or that maybe I just didn't want to admit I noticed. I'd say that it's weird how you've become quieter than you were because you were always so loud, and I'm not sure that I like it, because I think I actually liked it when you talked more. But still, I… I kind of like how we talk more to each other now. In class, and when you, you know, bumped into me the other day and – fuck, I still can't believe you actually apologised, though by now I think I sort of expected it."

Thalia laughed, but Harry didn't slow. He'd started and he couldn't stop. "I'd say how I've hardly ever looked at people and thought they were hot before, not in so many words, except that now when I think of you I think I can understand what that means. I don't know how I feel about that, or if it's a good thing or not, or if I'm even allowed to think that at all, but – but I do. I…"

Words died on Harry's tongue, but it wasn't horror that silenced them. Instead, something that felt a little funny, a little sad, and all too honest took its place. A breath of relief, or release, and Harry inhaled through the twinging feeling that still lingered in his chest.

"I don't think I could ever say it out loud to you," he said, his own words echoed back to him in the silent room, "but I do. I like you, Draco Malfoy. I think I actually do."

Silence. More silence. A ringing, calming, relieving silence that accepted Harry's words without judgment. Another slow inhalation eased the tightness in Harry's chest further, and for the first time since he'd charged blindly into the Room of Requirement, since he'd fled from the prefect's bathroom, he thought it would be okay. That he would be okay, and that –

"What?"

\- it would all go to hell.

That single word snapped the suspended thread of relief. Lurching upright, arms flung to his sides in a reflexive grasp for the solid safety of the fountain's wall, Harry spun towards the door into the room. He knew his mouth flop open but hadn't the thought to do anything about it. Horror renewed within him so thick and fast that it was like it had never gone away.

"Malfoy," he blurted out.

Across the room, Malfoy shifted between his feet. He was dressed again, and Harry hysterically thanked any god who was listening that the pale skin he'd caught an eyeful of earlier that evening was covered by thick robes. Malfoy's blond hair was almost luminescent in the thin darkness of the room, his face just as much, and the dark smudges of his eyes were trained directly upon Harry.

 _Fuck,_ hissed shrilly in Harry's head on repeat. _Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck –_

"Th-that was –" Scrambling to his feet, Harry couldn't bring himself to release his hold on the marble fountain that in that moment seemed about the only stable thing in his life. "That was –"

"Do you?"

Malfoy's words were quiet, expressionless, and Harry couldn't get any more of a read on him for it than he could from his blank face. Not even when Malfoy took a step forwards, sweeping silently across the short grass towards Harry and his fountain with its buck-naked statue.

"What are you doing here?" Harry asked, more than a little desperate. _Fuck, fuck, fuck -_

"The painting." Malfoy gestured towards the side wall, to where Harry's periphery caught sight of Terpsichore sidling back into her frame. "She came and got me a couple of minutes ago."

"Minutes?" Harry said, his voice as shrill in his ears as it was in his head. He shot Terpsichore a frantic glance. The traitor.

Malfoy nodded. He was close enough now that Harry could see the faint shadow of a frown on his brow, previously invisible. "Do you?"

"D-do I what?"

"Do you mean what you just said?"

Draco stopped. Directly before Harry, standing straight and tall, and as composed as he'd been for the entirety of that year in spite of everything that had befallen him, he planted himself with the quiet patience. Once, Harry doubted Draco Malfoy would have been capable of that much. He'd been a git, and a prat, and an obnoxious, spoiled twit of a Pureblood. But now?

 _Now, I really do like him,_ Harry thought. The voice in his head uttered a whimper.

"It's stupid," slipped from Harry's mouth before he even had the thought to utter it. "I know, it's – it's just a stupid little –"

"Do you?" Malfoy repeated.

Harry couldn't look at him anymore. Not at his face that didn't sneer at him like it used to. Not at the faint twitch of his eyebrow that could have risen, his lips quirking into a smirk of judgement and condescension just as he'd always worn but didn't. For whatever reason, whichever one had changed him, Malfoy didn't quite do that anymore. Not really.

Gaze falling to the ground, to the grass at Malfoy's feet and the small tuft of a flower that had poked through the crevice alongside the marble path, Harry swallowed. Honesty was thirsty work, it seemed, and so too was baring himself before the possibility of being cruelly judged. Because it _was_ judging – Malfoy knowing, finding out, entailed judgment from the worst possible quarter. Of all people, even Ron and Hermione who had the potential to feel so betrayed, Harry couldn't think of anyone he'd less wanted to know.

But it was out now. The Niffler was out of the bag. He may as well give it the go-ahead, even if the possibility of finding golden success was non-existent.

"Yeah," Harry said heavily. "I think I do."

Silence. More silence. The starkly truthful kind that this time it felt coloured far more with tragedy than comedy or hysteria. Only so recently and so quickly Harry had realised a spark of something had appeared, and yet now it was extinguished into death. It almost hurt, really. Somehow, unexpectedly, Harry realised that it sort of –

"Well, that's a relief."

Torn from his thoughts, from where he clutched the fountain like a lifeline and blinked back the upwelling of honest emotion building in his eyes, Harry lifted his gaze. Only to lower it again, following Malfoy's motion as he bent double and plucked the pale, unfurled flower from the grass at his feet. Hurting, yet almost as confused as he was hurt, Harry stared as Malfoy straightened and stepped across the short distance remaining between them.

"It's been a while, you know," Malfoy said, his gaze lowered and face downturned towards the flower in his hand. "For me, at least. Stupid, yes, but unavoidable and blatantly obvious to me."

Harry stared into his face, and his incomprehension grew. "What?"

"Yes, quite some time." The flower spun in Malfoy's fingers and he gave a smile that was almost but not quite a smirk. "I never would have considered the possibility of you eventually returning my feelings."

Harry blinked. "Wh… what?"

"I know you hated me, and I even hated you for most of that time, but definitely this year…"

"I don't – what?"

"To think, that a chance encounter in the bathroom that had you practically running screaming –"

"Screaming?"

"- would end like this." Malfoy glanced sidelong towards Terpsichore's portrait and tipped his head in an acknowledging nod. "Thanks are in order, I suppose."

Harry knew his mouth was hanging open again. He knew he stared like an idiot, and he continued to do nothing else when Malfoy turned back towards him. The smile – no, the smirk, for it was definitely more smirking than smiling this time – widened a little further. "So? What do you think?"

Harry shook his head slowly. He wanted to glance towards Calliope, to ask just what the hell was going on. He wanted to ask Clio if he was imagining things, or Melpomene if he was maybe only hearing what he wanted to be true. He wanted to ask Thalia if this was some kind of a sick joke, and that Malfoy's changes, his differences, the parts that Harry had noticed and had grown far too fond of in the past year, were hiding the real him from where they'd been lurking in wait to strike at the moment it would hurt the most.

But they didn't. Nothing happened and no one spoke. Harry couldn't look away from Malfoy, from his dark eyes that met Harry's and somehow seemed to brighten with each passing second. Not even when Malfoy extended the flower slightly towards him, twirling it before Harry's nose.

"It's customary to make some kind of offering when asking someone out, isn't it?" he asked.

Harry blinked. He stared, then blinked again. "You don't mean that."

"Don't I?" Malfoy asked, smirk that apparently wasn't quite so uncharacteristic of him nowadays widening further.

"You don't, you – you do. You do?" At Malfoy's silence, Harry huffed with a feeble attempt at laughter. "You actually do."

Malfoy gave an exaggerated shrug. "I can admit it when necessary."

"Can you?" Harry couldn't help but ask.

This time, Malfoy smiled. A real smile. A proper smile, and one that Harry didn't think he'd ever seen before. His breath caught at the sight of it, that Malfoy was smiling at _him,_ and for _him,_ and that there really was no doubt that he was good-looking. Harry couldn't withhold his answering grin.

"Well, you were the one that said it out loud first," Malfoy said. "What do you say, Potter? Will you go on a date with me?"

It was impossible. Inconceivable. An entirely foreign notion, and a concept that Harry hadn't even properly considered before stumbling into the Room of Requirement what now felt like so long ago. Maybe Calliope and the rest of the portraits had worked some kind of magic. Maybe it really was all his imagination, an illusion, something impossible brought to life.

But for the moment, Harry didn't care. Grinning like a fool, he plucked the flower from Draco's fingers. "Malfoy, I think that sounds like a bloody brilliant idea."

Malfoy smile-smirked. "You sound like a bit of a wanker when you say that, you know."

"I know. Jerk."

"Idiot."

"Git."

Even as he said it, Harry didn't think it meant quite what it used to. Spinning the flower between his own fingers, Harry thought Malfoy probably thought as much too. For whatever reason, despite the darkness painting the walls, when Malfoy took Harry's hand, the room felt just a little brighter.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading. I hope you enjoyed it! Please leave a comment to let me know your thoughts if you did!!


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